Aubrey Plaza detailed moment from sex scene with Robert De Niro that was actually 'real'

Playing up being weird or out-of-place has long been part of Aubrey Plaza's acting repertoire, from her very first roles on screen in the film Mystery Team and in her breakout role on the sitcom Parks and Recreation.

Plaza's unique delivery and natural talent for improv comedy has seen her star in a dozens of films and TV shows in the 17 years since she first appeared as moody intern April Ludgate - including a chance to work with movie legend Robert De Niro on Dirty Grandpa.

But her penchant for strangeness and commitment to her character, a young woman who is sexually obsessed with De Niro's septuagenarian character, ended up 'weirding out' her co-star, Plaza has said.

This included a sex scene between the then-31-year-old and 73-year-old actors that got a little too real for the Taxi Driver star, after Plaza committed a little too hard to her sex-crazed character's role in the 2016 gross-out comedy.

Working with De Niro got a little too real for Aubrey Plaza (Laurent Hou/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images)

“There was a lot of interesting stuff that went down, you know,” she said in a 2016 interview with Jimmy Kimmel where she went into detail about the 10-hour sex shoot, which involved the 40-year age gap pair taking a lot of cues from the director.

Not all of them landed.

Detailing one of the grosser moments, Plaza detailed: “I’d try to get in there and suck on his nipples, and he was like batting me away, and I didn’t know if it was in character or not.”

This led to her learning that 'Bob does not like his nipple area paid attention to,' after her acting got a bit too real. Leading Plaza to joke: "Great, now he thinks that I wanted to do that."

Plaza said that she had essentially no contact with De Niro off camera, so the only time she spoke to him was in her role as a sex-crazed college student. “I heard from my agent, who had spoken to his agent that he was legitimately scared of me,” she told Kimmel.

Adding: “Every time I was around him, it was right before we started shooting, so I would be all over him, and I think I really freaked him out.”

Aubrey Plaza said 'I was acting totally insane as the character because we were about to shoot. I don’t think he understood that wasn’t me' (Randy Holmes/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images)

Plaza spoke in more detail about this weird dynamic with the Raging Bull actor in a 2022 interview with Variety, where she shared: "I didn’t really have a relationship with him off camera because he’s him.

“I didn’t have time to get to know him, he shows up in a puff of smoke and there’s no chatting at the water cooler.”

But while she thought De Niro was an enigmatic legend of cinema who just appeared to shoot the scenes, Plaza got the impression that her co-star was genuinely scared of her.

Plaza said: "By the time he’d show up, I’m in character. My character had one goal: To have sex with him. I was acting totally insane as the character because we were about to shoot. I don’t think he understood that wasn’t me.

"You’d think he would because he’s an actor and an amazing one.”

But, perhaps, De Niro was also deep in character as, once filming had stopped, he didn't seem to know who Plaza was. She share her recollection of a post-shoot party: “I showed up and he’s like, ‘Who are you sweetheart?’ and after that he was normal.

"At first I think I came on really strong. I did some questionable things I wouldn’t do anymore.”